Art: Calder's Universe

"The underlying sense of form in my work has been the system of the
Universe, or part thereof." On reading this pompous remark by Alexander
Calder, the most internationally celebrated of all living American
sculptors, one's hopes rise. Make way for the cosmic perspective! In
fact, as the Whitney Museum's new retrospective of the work of this
venerable figure testifies, his achievement is more modest and
realistic. In the 200-odd works that make up "Calder's Universe," as
the show is called, there is little of the real universe, but a
pervasive flavor of its metaphors: orreries, planetary clockwork,
automata. The Copernican...